Safety information recently released by Medicare that compares the rate and type of medical malpractice acts and patient complications resulting in personal injury occurring at the nation's hospitals has engendered lively debate in the medical community.

Administrators at teaching hospitals in Connecticut and elsewhere are likely among the most interested of all debate observers, given the singling out of such institutions as facilities where patients are at greatest risk for developing preventable complications. Government researchers have tagged some of the country's most preeminent teaching hospitals as places where patients might actually have the highest likelihood of suffering medical harm.

That assessment has solicited both supportive and strongly critical responses.

The information being published is a direct byproduct of a 2010 federal law that brings vast changes to the health-care landscape. Central to release of the data is the underlying premise that it will push hospitals and clinics to improve care and services, which will result in the two-fold benefit of lowering medical costs and improving patient outcomes.

Some hospitals welcome the public disclosures regarding patients' assessments of their stays, readmission and mortality rates, hospitals' hygienic practices, the number of facility-acquired infections and similar information.

Others, quite flatly, don't, with a common refrain of discontent echoing this sentiment: The numbers released are often overly simplistic, improperly targeted and skewed for exaggerating problems at facilities that see high numbers of difficult cases.

Says one critic: "Not all these metrics are ready for prime time." Adds another: "People are careful at documenting, almost to a fault, things that are incidental to the case."

Medicare dismisses much of that criticism, with one official responding that the indicators are appropriately identified and serve an important function in "leveling the playing field" for comparing the overall level of care received at various facilities.

Source: Washington Post, "Medicare study finds teaching hospitals have higher risk of complications; findings disputed," Jordan Rau, Feb. 12, 2012

tags: medical malpractice, personal injury